1. Technical Field
The invention relates to floor care appliances. Particularly, the invention relates to tool storage for floor care appliances. Even more particularly, the invention relates to a tool storage door which encloses a tool storage compartment of a floor care appliance.
2. Background Information
It is well known to provide on-board tool storage on floor care appliances. On-board tool storage provides increased flexibility to various types of floor care appliances, such as upright vacuum cleaners, canister vacuum cleaners or upright extractors as having accessory tools stored on-board allows the floor care appliance to be easily changed between on-the-floor cleaning and above-the-floor cleaning. The accessory tools are typically stored within a tool storage compartment formed within a housing of the floor care appliance. For aesthetic purposes and to assist in preventing the tools from falling out of the storage compartment, a tool storage door is often used to enclose the tool storage compartment.
Although some tool storage doors are opaque, often tool storage doors are formed of a transparent material to provide visibility to the accessory tools both during use and at the point of sale of the floor care appliance. A transparent tool storage door allows the user to quickly identify the desired tool location when changing to and from above-the-floor cleaning. A transparent tool storage door also provides visibility to the accessory tools at the point-of-sale to inform the consumer as to what accessory tools are included with the purchase of the floor care appliance. Further, some accessory tools may add significant value to the floor care appliance or include graphics which inform the consumer as to specific features of the accessory tool. It would be advantageous to prominently display these accessory tools at the point of sale to assist the consumer in making a purchasing decision.
Although prior art tool storage doors are adequate for the purposes for which they are intended, these prior art tool storage doors do not effectively communicate to the consumer which accessory tools are included with the purchase of the floor care appliance or may not adequately display the features or graphics of the accessory tool. For example, opaque tool storage doors obstruct visibility into the tool storage compartment, thus requiring the consumer to open the tool storage door to determine what accessory tools are included with the floor care appliance. However, access to the floor cleaning appliance is not always available at the point of sale. Transparent tool storage doors are intended to alleviate this problem by providing visibility into the tool storage compartment however, it is possible that in some well lit retail stores a glare is produced on the transparent tool door making the contents of the tool storage compartment not readily apparent. Further, some tool storage doors are tinted for aesthetic purposes making it difficult to view the accessory tools stored within the tool storage compartment.
Thus, it would be desirable for a tool storage door to provide direct and unobstructed visibility to the accessory tools yet retain the accessory tools within the tool storage compartment. This direct and unobstructed visibility to the accessory tools not only would eliminate the effects of glare but also would allow the consumer to see any graphics or features of the accessory tools which may assist the consumer in making a purchasing decision.
Additionally, tool storage compartments typically include a fixed number of tool storage recesses for storing specific types of accessory tools. Adding an accessory tool to the floor care appliance would require substantial modifications to the floor care appliance body, which is both time consuming and expensive for the manufacturer. Thus, it would be desirable to provide a tool storage door which allows additional accessory tools to be added to the floor care appliance with minimal changes being required to the floor care appliance body.
Therefore, the need exists for a tool storage door which allows a floor care appliance accessory tool to be held within a tool storage compartment while still providing direct visibility to the tool during use and at the point-of-sale of the floor care appliance, and which allows an accessory tool to be added to the floor care appliance unit without substantial modifications to the appliance body.
Objectives of the invention include providing a new and improved tool storage door for a vacuum cleaner tool storage compartment.
A further objective is to provide a new and improved tool storage door which provides increased visibility to accessory tools stored within the tool storage compartment.
A still further objective is to provide a new and improved tool storage door which encloses the tool storage compartment and prevents inadvertent removal of the accessory tools.
These and other objectives will be readily apparent from the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. In carrying out the invention in one form thereof, these objectives and advantages are obtained by providing